Try to cut down on the background noise.

I just turned on the mics for the folks that are in the room, so hopefully it'll cut down on the noise.

Okay.

So we have a quorum.

The next thing on our agenda is the acceptance of the journal.

So the Journal of Proceedings for the Community Relations Commission meeting held on June 11th, 2026.

Do we have a motion?

We have a motion and a second.

Is there any discussion?

Second.

Motion, second, and no discussion.

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

The journal has been approved.

Okay.

The next thing on our agenda is a communication.

Uh just reminding us of the mayor's open door meetings with the commission that's set for September 25th 2026 from 10 to noon.

We have no public speakers this evening.

So we will move to our information only session and invite City of Rockford Community and Economic Development Department Planning and Zoning Division update from Scott Capavella, the planning and zoning manager.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Just want to make sure this mic's working.

It's been a while since we've had live microphones in this body here.

So I just want to um thank everybody for being here.

Um I'm happy to uh um to give you a little update about what's going on and um things like that.

And I know that so there's there's always discussions as to you know why do we have zoning?

And of course, uh the purpose of uh our zoning ordinance is to protect and promote the public health, safety, and general welfare, uh protect the character of established residential neighborhoods, and maintain orderly and compatible development patterns that promote an appropriate mix of land use and protect and conserve property values.

Now those are basically three of the the 15 points that are stated in the beginning of the ordinance under our legal framework and Article 10.

There are others that also talk about how zoning's purpose is to provide uh job bases and economic development, um, provide walkability and uh mixed use developments.

Uh it it you know it discusses uh providing a variety of of uh housing types, etc.

So if you look at that um you'll notice that there's a lot more than just the the ones that I uh ran through here, but these are like the general ones that you will see with every community.

So moving along, um in Rockford we have six types of residential zoning districts, but only five are used to designate land.

Um you'll see I have down the uh the the different types there and the square footages that are required for uh a lot that would be created for a new lot in today's standards.

Um and also includes the lot the required lot width.

I put a little asterisk next to the R1U um single family residential urban.

Uh that was a designation in 2008 that for some reason um after they approved the zoning ordinance did not approve the zoning map to change some areas of Rockford to R1U.

So they just remained everything remained R1.

And R1U basically would have been older areas of Rockford, I would say um based on the previous discussions uh with our city administrator Todd Cagnoni, who was in my position uh a few years back.

Um the near east side, um just east of the river, kind of south of rural, over to say um maybe just over to Calvin Park, um and areas in midtown, midtown north, uh kind of in the old Churchill park area, and then um immediate areas just north of of City Hall, uh as well as on the west side, uh basically on the south side of West State.

Most of those lots were all developed, they were like 50 feet wide, maybe 125, 150 feet deep.

The idea being that we would require a smaller base lot, but for some reason it just it just they just decided not to go with it.

But it's still considered one of our zoning districts.

So if somebody ever came in and wanted to do a new development, and uh they said, hey, I want to change my zoning to R1U, and they'll follow the guidelines of a 6,000 square foot lot that's only 50 feet wide.

Um we would definitely entertain uh a zoning map amendment for that, and we would look at that that development just like we would any other development.

So any questions about any of those zoning districts at all right now.

All right.

Uh then I'll keep moving along and we'll talk about like zoning and housing and how those two kind of mesh together and what types of housing can be built in each one of the districts.

And so the rural estate district is most of the time, if you look at one of our maps, that's basically our parks.

Um I find uh a couple of larger uh pockets that might be zoned RE that are along I think Mulford Road near there's some large five-acre estates that are off there and the little dip where Keith Creek runs through just to the west of Aldean Park.

Um but but really most of the stuff you're gonna find um is gonna be zoned R1 that's single family residential.

Uh and and obviously um that district is just a single family district.

Uh anybody who would establish uh a lot today, the average would have to be 7700 square feet with 70 feet of frontage.

So that would mean your minimum uh lot depth would be 110.

Um R1U would be the same thing, only it would be smaller lot size.

R2 we would allow both single family and two families.

Um the idea being that um you have a little larger lot to accommodate uh duplexes, and most of today people want to have uh uh a garage with those duplexes, and many of them are two car garages.

Um we found that you know the the average in order to fit those on the on that type of lot that size, um 80 feet was uh kind of the required width in order to meet that and and still meet setbacks and have space between adjacent property as well.

Um so our minimum setbacks for zoning are six feet on side yards, and in the case uh we have uh up to a hundred feet, we we have what we call the 20% rule.

And so that would mean if you were on an 80-foot wide lot and one side was six feet, then you you'd have to make sure that the other side in this case would be ten feet because you'd have to have at least sixteen feet of side yard total.

Um that's to kind of vary the the lots, and in some cases you might have a larger gap between you know developments uh uh side yards because of that, uh, but at the same time um, you know, it just provides a little bit of width.